Another Blog Hiatus

I've had several friends and family ask if I was taking another blog hiatus. Oh gosh!

I totally forgot that I hadn't written how I had to step back from my blog again for a short while. It's been a crazy 2 months with the VERY taxing, aggravating, stressful bathroom renovation for my 95 year old mom and then our 2 week trip to see our daughter, son and their families in Illinois. Keola and family are only in the U.S. once a year because of their jobs overseas. 

Therefore this was a very important, eagerly anticipated trip for us. It was a time for us all to finally, finally all be together again even if it could only be for one and a half week.

One thing I LOVED seeing was the bonding of the cousins. 17 year old KC has never been one to babysit little children. As an only child, she's not super comfortable with little kids.

However, once our grandsons discovered that she seemed to know a LOT about the Minecraft video game (that she played when she was much younger), they considered her their hero, their video game guru. RK would often want to hold her hand when we were out walking and they both relied on her for computer help.

And we were proud of KC's gentle affection and patience for her young cousins who loved being in her company.

However, we returned to Hawaii to find mom's worsening memory difficulties and fixing up a few more problems with the bathroom/house renovation which we are taking care of ourselves.

Anyway... life is full of things we have to deal with and we are dealing with it.

I miss talking to you all, but will be back soon. Until then, I just wanted to send my love to you all.

Back in Illinois

By the time this post goes up, I will be in Chicago visiting with my daughter, and her family. We made this second trip back because our son, Keola and family would be returning to the U.S. for their once a year trip to visit family and touch bases with their U.S. work people.

July 22nd: We’re in Illinois waiting for our son and family to arrive tonight from Michigan where they were visiting with our daughter-in-law’s family. Their schedule is hectic going from Michigan to Illinois to D.C. to I don’t know where. Whatever the case, one thing our son wanted to do was take our grandsons to a Cubs game. 😄 We’ll try to cram as much as we can in the short time they’ll be here. There really is so much to do in Chicago. 

I just noticed this book by R.J. Palacio called 365 Days of Wonder (Mr. Browne’s Book of Precepts)  that my daughter has displayed in her family room.

In case you can’t read the saying on the side, it says: “Remember there’s no such thing as a small act of kindness. Every act creates a ripple with no logical end.” —Scott Adams

I’m sorry I haven't been able to visit you all. I'll need to catch up when I get back. It’s been an insanely crazy, stress-filled 2 months prior to this trip. My glucose levels skyrocketed. I lost 5 pounds and haven’t been able to sleep much.

Amazingly, in the 4 days since we’ve been here in Chicago, my morning fasting glucose levels dropped to acceptable levels. My son-in-law and daughter has been cooking up a delicious storm to make me gain my weight back.

Also: I’d like to just let you know that after all the aggravation of the renovation, it was completed the day before we left for Chicago. The contractor managed to finish our ‘punch list’ of corrections that we wanted  done (before we paid him). 😊

More Stresssssss

As if we didn't have enough stress going on in our lives presently, I found mom sitting at her desk looking dazed one evening. She said she'd fallen and hit her head. Sure enough, there was a lump on the left side of her forehead.

However, she seemed OK for the next couple of hours and went to bed.

Buuut... then I wondered.

Both her sisters had also fallen when they were alive. My auntie Grace even had a brain bleed and had to be operated on.

Art and I thought about it that evening and early the following morning, we took mom to Kaiser's Emergency Room.

First of all, the nurses all told us how surprised they were at how spry she was. They could hardly believe she was almost 95. They even teased asking if I was her sister. They were joking, I think.

A very friendly doctor came in, checked her out and ordered a CAT scan of her head. He told me he was from Rockford, Illinois. Good gosh! What a coincidence! We exchanged a few stories about our lives in Illinois. 

The CAT Scan revealed that mom had again escaped serious injury. Her brain was fine. However, the doctor said after 90, it's a lot safer to use a walker.

Sigh... I told him there was no way I'd get her to use a walker. 

When a wheelchair was brought to take her out, mom told them she didn't need it. I reminded her to just accept it gracefully since they'd brought it. She felt it was unnecessary, but smiled and let the nurse take her to the exit door after which she bounced out of the chair and was going to walk unassisted to the car before I took her arm. 😏

Ahhh well... Mom is doing fine. Me? 

Sigh...

Amidst the Chaos of the Renovation... Art's 80th Birthday!

It would have been nice to have a happy celebration for this big milestone, but we were so stressed from the renovation that we couldn't think of anything else.

However, on the morning of Art's birthday, we were having bananas with our cereal and decided to see who could pull out a longer nub from our fruit.

That was THE longest nub either of us has ever pulled out of our apple bananas. 

Then our son, sent a video of our grandsons wishing their grandpa a Happy Birthday!

My brother stopped by with a giant watermelon that my sister-in-law had chosen. It was perfect!

A couple of hours later our daughter, Tiffany had a gorgeous fruit tart and watermelon Outshine bars delivered to us. A card was also sent with a sign made by our granddaughter.

In the afternoon, we had a 2.5 hour video call with our son in South Asia and our daughter in Chicago.

And then..... would you believe my cousin (who happens to have two mango trees) surprised us with these amazing mangos? Jon and Tif were very, very impressed. They LOVE mangoes too.

So in the end, Art had a very nice birthday indeed!

More Renovation Fixes

The renovation of the 2 bathrooms downstairs has so stressed me out that I've lost 5 pounds in 1 and a half months. My glucose levels have also spiked from all the tension.

However, it's slowly, slowly coming to a close with Art and me doing touch-ups here and there on our own.

Friends of ours had stopped by and noticed imperfections in the wall that our contractor had tried to work on. I was worried that these problems would be overlooked and painted over like he did on the stair handholds. 

I plastered over the nail because we didn't want to pound it in for fear it would pop out on the other side of the single wall redwood panel. Art showed me how to shine a light from the side to make sure the edges were smooth. I covered up the other dents as well.

As it turned out, when we told the contractor that we wanted the stair handholds to be smoothed out, an actual painter came and did a wonderful job. He worked very hard to smooth out the rough surface. He also painted the above wall and fixed all the other problems. That was a relief.

Remember that crack that the demolition crew made on the single wall redwood?  At first the contractor told us we’d have to get someone else to fix it. So I asked my cousin (who works for a big time contractor who does jobs for corporations for a quote) and another contractor who did our friend’s house. I passed on the expensive quotes to our contractor.

Our contractor said he would do the drywall over the crack his crew made. We used to have a magnetic photo board there. The wall looks so different now, and it's kind of startling every time we pass by. It's OK though. We did also ask that it be trimmed, because it didn't look good with the raw edges. Art stained the trim to match before it was installed.

But now there's a problem with the vanity in mom's bathroom which we hope he will fix. I've already written about the side of the vanity being damaged. 

We also noticed that there were two cracks on the Staron backsplash.

The contractor said it was just paint. 

We said it wasn't.

I hope he will fix it.

So aside from all this, the bathrooms are getting close to being done.

Here's mom's tub area.

It will be a lot easier for her to step in and out of the shower now.

The vanity area still has work to be done on those backsplash cracks and the side of the cabinet, but we're almost there.

And we were only a day away from leaving for Illinois to see our son and his family who were returning to the U.S. for a short stay so they could visit with my daughter-in-law's family in Michigan and us.

I want you to know that along with losing that weight, I must now have a lot more gray hairs.

Sigh...

This is the 3rd renovation (in Illinois and here) we've done, but we were a lot younger when we did the other 2 and we did more of the work ourselves. It's very hard to watch someone else do it and know you could do better.

Adding a Stair Railing to the 2nd Floor

I wrote a post in 2012 about two bloggers whose husband or themselves had fallen on their stairs and it got me thinking because we had handrails on just one side. Dianne of Schmidleysscribbling who sadly passed away in 2017 told me I needed to add handrails on both sides.

I convinced Art to add another hand rail.

However, he added the beautiful handrail just partway down. It was enough, buuut... I thought it would be nice to have it go all the way down.

Since we were having this renovation, I added the handrail to go all the way down to the 1st floor. Besides, I'm 12 years older now. 😊

I'm happy. Mom had to go upstairs to take a nap during some of the renovation and it was really needed to help her to climb the stairs.

That will be me someday.

Actually, it's me today.

POSTSCRIPT 1:

OK.... The new handrail was not sanded well enough so parts of it feel very rough compared to the rest of the handrails that our previous carpenter, Steve and Art installed. (The contractor instead of the carpenter had done that finishing painting without properly sanding it smooth.)  I was going to sand it myself but Art said the contractor should do it.

You can also see the space that I'm going to want to eventually caulk. The handrails that Steve and Art installed do not have that space. Sigh... 

I'd looked up Steve, who was truly a skilled craftsman and was shocked and saddened to learn he had suddenly passed away in March. He was only 64 years old!

POSTSCRIPT 2:

We added the rough handrail to our punch list and this time a skilled painter was brought in who sanded and painted the handrail properly so it was more comfortable to hold.

Adding to the Stress

As if this whole project of renovating two of the bathrooms downstairs for mom which was to last a little over two weeks and is lasting more like a month and a half wasn't bad enough, we had this happen.

Yup. 😬

Art was going for an early morning jog and fell while avoiding a homeless person who was sleeping on the sidewalk. 

He hobbled home and I cleaned his many wounds and applied a bandage to it. However, when he was about to take a shower in the early evening, I saw that the wounds just didn't look good.

We spent 4 hours at the Tripler Army Hospital ER. They cleaned him up even more, applied Mupirocin which is an antibiotic ointment and took a huge battery of  X-rays even though Art said he didn't feel any pain. I needed to then change the dressings 2-3 times a day and look for signs of infection.

The nurse who took care of him gave me an arsenal of adhesive non-stick bandages called Telfa, Mupirocin, tape, cleaning thing-a-bobs and I forget what else. That was very helpful! 

A couple of days later, Art was once again busy. He had to go looking for a strip of redwood for us to sand, stain and fit over the crack left in mom's bedroom wall by the demolition crew.

The color of the redwood was darker than we hoped and the stain didn't lighten it, buuut since the surrounding wood had so many different colors, we figured we'd just be satisfied with that.

One week later, while I was helping mom with her shower in the more or less completed guest bathroom, she brushed her arm against the shower spout and ripped off some skin.

I couldn't believe it! 

So now I had two patients.

The contractor has said that he will replace that spout with something we can choose. We found one on Amazon which is the same style as what we have in our master bathroom.

We felt around the edges and it's all smooth.

I'm exhausted.

I now have a huge supply of First Aid materials. 

I spoke to the Kaiser Advice nurse and she gave me a lot of information and reassurance to treat my 95 year old mom. 

I'm stressed and exhausted and really looking forward to this being over.

Demolition of Mom's Bathroom and Installation of Vanity and Sink Cabinet

The crew did the demolition for mom's bathroom so I had to help mom take a bath in the guest bathroom. And that's when we had a problem. The plumber did show me where the spout, shower and wand was but I guess we really didn't understand it well enough and there was no diagram.

When I tried to give mom her shower, I discovered there were a lot more settings. And of course, they were unmarked. So I ended up making a diagram and taping it to the shower wall so I could remember where the diverter settings were. 

The water was also pretty tepid for the entire time I helped her with her shower. Art didn't quite understand it so he got some buckets and ran the water. After 3 buckets full on the hottest setting it was still only luke warm. 

And now the demolition.

I texted our contractor asking if I should warn the demolition crew to be careful because it is a single wall redwood construction. He said it was unnecessary because he already had. 

All the banging we heard was disconcerting and sure enough... there was another crack. This time it was on mom's bedroom wall.

They took out mom's bathtub, toilet and sink cabinet and installed the new cabinet.

POSTSCRIPT 1:

Although there was nothing that could be done about having too many diverter choices, plumber Josh was able to adjust the settings so we could get a hotter temperature in the guest shower.

Mom will never have to worry about this once her bathroom is done because we stipulated that she couldn't have this sort of control. I'll also keep the diagram for anybody who needs to use the guest shower in the future.

POSTSCRIPT 2:

The cabinet and sink were installed in mom's bathroom, buuuut.... I saw later that there was a gouge on the outer wall of the cabinet.

This was frustrating. The contractor said the entire cabinet and sink would have to be removed and a new one would have to be termite treated and installed.

My brother who once worked for a cabinet company and Art who worked with my cousin to install our kitchen cabinets 17 years ago knew that a simple veneer panel could be placed over it to cover the gouge.

I told the contractor and he procured the veneer immediately. 

Unfortunately, the veneer was not clamped on properly by the carpenter and was sticking out the side of the cabinet. (I took the photo on the right with my iPhone facing up from the floor.) You can see the glob of glue keeping the veneer from sticking properly to the cabinet. My brother explained that the veneer should have been clamped on after gluing to prevent this from happening.

Another customer who may not have worked at renovating their own home might have accepted this flaw. But it was impossible for Art to be happy about this.

Sooo... we'll see what they do.

Bathroom Renovation: Painting Touch-Ups, Plumbing, Toilet Trauma

I've decided to write a general sequence of the bathroom renovation progress instead of the daily stress we were having to deal with after the initial calm start. The first part of this project was to complete the guest bathroom downstairs so mom could use it while her bathroom was being renovated.

The electricians came in and changed the direction of the lights they'd installed. I was worried about the bugs and dust that could fall in.

The mirror with storage was installed, but was cheaper and flimsier looking than what we expected so the contractor said he would order another one.

We'd asked for a faucet with a hot and cold water handle which would be less confusing for mom. But this one control faucet was installed. The contractor said he would order the correct one.

Then the Costco Toto toilet we ordered was installed.

To our shock, the floor to seat was higher than what we expected.

The diagram showed that the height was supposed to be 15.6875" from floor to seat.

When we looked at the box the toilet came in AFTER it was installed, it said it was rim and 17.6875" to 16.5625" to the bowl the seat. 

That's when we saw that the specifications is DIFFERENT from the diagram. Arrghh!

We'd bought it at Costco because the contractor had told us that the cost of a Toto toilet would range from $2,200-$7,600 a piece and he’d have to raise our contract price by as much as 20%-40%.

However, when mom sat on the Costco toilet her feet were dangling in the air!

So we decided to bite the bullet and go to The Bathroom Store and just pay the money for a shorter Toto toilet. What a shock when the sales representative, 'Steve' told us they were having a 25% discount so it actually cost us $536.39! The Costco Toto toilet was $748.99 with shipping included. But then there's the tax. Steve also told us the Board of Water supply would be giving $100 rebates for water efficient toilets unless they run out of funds.

When I told the contractor about our upset, he said he would make it right and bring the 2 Costco toilets to the store for refunds. We then bought an additional low toilet from The Bathroom Store the next day. 

Sigh... 

On to the next problem...

When the bathroom door was cut at the bottom to fit, some of the wood veneer skin on the lauan door flaked off. 

It's an old door. 

It happens.

The contractor suggested we buy a roll of the veneer banding on Amazon.

Art hated to buy 25 feet of this banding for such a short bit we needed so he decided to glue the loose, thin veneers on both sides of the door. He then found a thin slat from his wood scrap stockpile, painted it the same color as the trim in the bathroom and glued it on.

Then I asked the contractor if I could now apply some clear caulk to the spaces on the grab bars. He did not recommend it saying it's bound to peel off and mold would just settle on top of the caulk.

I looked online and found this on GrabBars.com. 

You don’t have to caulk around shower grab bars; however, we do recommend applying a silicone sealant around grab bars in your shower. This will help prevent water from seeping into the holes where the grab bar is mounted, which could cause mold or mildew growth.

The best and easiest way to ensure your shower grab bars are their most secure and durable is to apply a silicone sealant around the upper half after they have been professionally installed into the tiles or shower wall. The silicone sealant will block out any moisture from getting behind the flange covers. If you do not seal around the upper half of your grab bar, water will get behind the flange covers, sit there, and begin to rust the stainless steel grab bars over time. This would then require you to replace the damaged grab bars.

So I did it. I caulked all the spaces.

However.... Arrghhh... When I asked Josh, the plumber about it, he said I should use a special silicon caulk. Doggone it!

Sigh...

So here we are now.

The lower Toto toilet and bidet have replaced the taller Costco toilet.

There's still the shower bar to go up so the height of the spray can be adjusted to mom's height.

Knobs have to be installed on the the new cabinet doors. The fan is still missing.

Shelf liners need to be placed. 

However, the contractor says mom can use the shower now.

She'll have to because he's already started the demolition of her bathroom although he said we could have two days to acclimate mom to the new configuration of the guest shower. 

POSTSCRIPT 1:

We had a confrontation with the contractor who suddenly arrived in the evening. He told us we are the most difficult people he's had to work with and we'd caused him quite a bit of consternation. He reminded us that he's had excellent YELP reviews. And yes, he has. That's why Art chose him.

I told him the debacle of the toilet choice and then getting fixtures installed that we hadn't chosen really made us lose confidence in him. He said the erroneous price information he gave us was because his previous client had asked for an extremely expensive toilet and he thought we might too. 

He said everything would be remedied with a punch list that we could provide just as he fixed the problem with the lower Toto toilets and nicer vanity mirror he installed.

So there's hope. Perhaps it will go better from this on end. 

We'll see.

POSTSCRIPT 2:

Since the contractor was pretty frustrated with us being frustrated with him, we decided to just return the Costco toilets ourselves instead of waiting for him to do it as he said he would. Our neighbor helped us load the toilets into our van and my brother and sister-in-law met us at Costco and helped us load it onto a cart to return them. The one saving grace was that when I explained what happened to the return desk, they immediately accepted the toilets and refunded us everything including the shipping! It was that easy. I was amazed!

Finally... something easy. Sigh...

POSTSCRIPT 3: (July 6th after over a month and a half of renovation)

A couple of weeks later the contractor arrived at our dinner time because he was upset that we were still angry and didn't seem to trust him. We were able to talk everything through. 

We explained that this all began with him sending us the text that our price would be raised 20%-40% if we chose the Toto toilet, installing fixtures we hadn’t chosen and also putting in other items that appeared cheaper than what we expected. He says that he never meant he would have to raise our price. He meant he would then have to raise his own costs. He asked why we didn’t go to the Bathroom Store. We told him it was because he sent us to a website that showed Toto toilets only in the $2,000 to $8,000 price range. And so it went.

I kept thinking back to when I was teaching my first graders a unit on how to manage arguments and confrontations. I used it on myself to control how I reacted to what he was saying. In the end, believe it or not... we were at a healthier place 🤞and he smiled and said he'd like to be friends. We do too.

Bathroom Renovation: Day 7-8-9 (Installing the Tile Flooring, Vanity and Vanity Top)

It was now the electricians turn to come and put in the wiring for the Toto bidet, wall and ceiling lights and electrical outlets. 

Bill and May were very kind and patient about putting in an additional outlet we needed and switching the lights around to see if we liked the lights facing up or down.

They were still very kind and patient when I asked them to switch it to face down a couple of days later. I was afraid of dust and bugs falling in.

Later that evening, our contractor asked us to also paint the bottoms of the walls even though the vanity would be covering the area. 

Buuut... although it turned out later that we didn't have to, it was nice to know that back of the vanity would have a fresh coat of paint.

The following day, Ed returned to put in the tile flooring.

He did an awesome job of staggering the tile for a different design from what Art did in our kitchen 17 years ago. 

Art was amazed at all the new material and techniques Ed had to make the job much easier than what Art used.

Here we are back to painting in gouges or scratches on the wall.

Ed then added in the grout for the tile.

The vanity and counter top went in next.

There were different teams for tiling, electrical, plumbing and carpentry.

And amidst all this stress we got a call from the window people telling us that replacement glass had come in to replace faulty, leaking panes we'd had installed 17 years ago when we did the house renovation.

And so it went.

I really wish we hadn't put in white grout in the kitchen and upstairs bathrooms 17 years ago. Gray grout would certainly have hid the dirt better.

OK... Let's see...

Now we need the toilet, faucets and shower things to go in.

I was feeling a little calmer now.